The Effect of Hydrophilicity/hydrophobicity Ratio of Coal Surface on the Column Flotation Process

Abstract

Continuous column flotation is one of an economical coal cleaning processes. In this study, we exam-ined the effect of hydrophilicity and hydrophobicitiy of coal surface on the continuous column flotation processes. We found that Wallarah coal was most suitable coal for the coal cleaning by the column flotation. From a static separation of film flotation, we found that the floatability of coal particle strongly depended on the hydrophilicity and hydrophobicity of coal surface. On the other hand, the trend of demineralization and the ratio of carbonaceous recovery could be predicted by the observation of methylene-blue adsorption test.